Hospitals sues patient, patient sues back and wins

Both Samaritan Hospital and its patient, Christine Matson of East Poestenkill, made mistakes in the case I’m writing about today. But I think the hospital’s mistakes were bigger. And I
think the whole mess was the hospital’s fault to begin with. Read on and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

When Christine Matson gave birth to her son Jacob five years ago, she had a lot to be thankful for: a healthy baby, no complications, and good health insurance. But that didn’t
stop Samaritan Hospital from taking Matson and her husband Joshua to court.

About three years ago, the Matsons received a bill for $4,400. When Christine asked the hospital about it she was told it was for costs incurred for the birth of her son. Apparently,
she learned, the hospital didn’t correctly bill the Matson’s insurance company within the timelimit imposed by the insurer. So the hospital went after the Matsons instead.

The Matsons refused to pay. And the hospital fought back. Samaritan took the Poestenkill couple to State Supreme Court. The Matsons did not appear in court and lost by default.

Christine Matson said she was never informed of the court date, and that she would have been “crazy” to intentionally skip it.

“I have proof right here that I was insured. I would have loved to show the judge,” she said. She acknowledged that not being there for court was her biggest mistake, and said she’s
a law-abiding citizen who knows better than to ignore a judge.

But as a result of missing court, her husband Joshua Matson, a construction foreman, had his wages garnished until the $4,400 was paid off. She said she didn’t even know there was a
court action until the hospital began taking money directly out of his paycheck.

“That was humiliating,” Matson said.

In the spring of 2006 the Matsons sued the hospital in Small Claims Court. This time they won a judgement to have their $4,400 returned.

So now the couple was repaid, but still not made completely whole.

The wage garnishment ruined Joshua Matson’s credit score, hurting his ability to borrow money or get credit cards. This, at a time when the couple were attempting to build a house
and furnish it.

“He couldn’t even get a Lowe’s card,” Matson said.
So she called the hospital several times and asked if she could have some help undoing the damage to her credit report. Matson said she was assured by hospital staff members that she
would get some help, in the form of a letter to the three major credit reporting agencies, but that help didn’t come for months. Eventually the hospital sent her a letter she could send to
the credit reporting agencies, but the agencies, which each calculate a consumer’s credit score, said the letter wouldn’t work.

In fact, if you have a dispute with something on your credit report, you should send a certified letter to each of the three credit reporting agencies, Equifax, Experian, and
TransUnion. I’ll have their addresses posted on my Web site at timesunion.com/advocate. Include the relevant documentation and, by law, the agencies will have to investigate the
dispute and respond to you within 30 days.

Samaritan admitted it made mistakes in the Matson’s case. The first mistake was an incorrect billing code for Matson, which led the hospital to conclude the couple had no
insurance coverage. The hospital tried to reach the Matsons several times but the couple never responded, said Samaritan spokeswoman Angela Yu.

Matson said she didn’t respond, at first, because she knew she was insured. She said she would have done anything to resolve this situation as quickly as possible.

Finally, Christine Matson said, she’s disappointed that for all the trouble she went through, she and her husband never received an apology from the hospital. Samaritan’s Yu
offered this, in written response to my questions about the Matson’s case.
“Samaritan Hospital regrets any errors it made in this matter and any part those errors played in the Matsons’ present difficulties.” She went on to say this could have been avoided
if the couple had responded more quickly to the original hospital bills.

Now it is up to the Matsons to make sure their credit is finally repaired. It’s up to the hospital to realize that what may be a small error on their part could snowball into years of
worry and problems for its patients.

Anyone who gets a bill, whether they feel they don’t have to pay it or not because of insurance, should always always always call the place and say, “This was billed to our insurance, right? Please confirm what insurance information you have for this bill” And follow through by contacting your insurance in a couple of weeks after that, and double check it’s been submitted. People are human. Be Proactive! Yes Samaritan should have checked their files, apologized, but clearing up her credit for her? If she had just paid attention and called the hospitals when the bills kept coming, her credit wouldn’t have been affected. All the hospitals photocopy the cards. So where did her copy go? She also could have asked if the insurance info was in her son’s file if they didn’t have it, or faxed another copy to them. Anytime you get any bill you shouldn’t leave it alone, don’t ignore it, call the business and clear it up. Ignore it and it’s now YOU who is to fault.

Hospital billing is a nightmare. The Matsons compounded the hospital’s mistake by not exercising their consumer rights. The Matson’s first mistake was in not immediately protesting the billing error to the hospital and to the insurance company in writing by certified letter; even if you know you’re in the right, you have to protest any error immediately and in writing. The Matsons could have also filed a complaint with the NYS Consumer Protection Bureau which might have been able to intercede on their behalf. The Matsons should have immediately notified the 3 credit reporting agencies in writing, again by certified letter, of the nature of the dispute and asked that a written statement be included with any credit reporting information sent to prospective creditors; that is the Matson’s right under the Fair Credit Reporting Act. The Matsons should have also contacted the clerk of the State Supreme Court with respect to the notification of the court date because that’s a written, mailed document which they apparently never received. Had the Matsons acted aggressively at the outset, the ensuing problems might never have occurred.

It definitely sucks that the hospital made such a huge error, however, these errors really aren’t that uncommon. That is why it is absolutely crucial to be vigilant about repsonding to anything that seems out of the ordinary. I can’t tell you how many times I have been billed incorrectly by hospitals, labs, etc. One hospital tried to charge my grandmother for services incurred 2 months after her death! While I am not placing the blame on Matson, I’m really not sure that this is an appropriate article for the advocate. While Samaritan acted inappropriatley, they did nothing wrong except make an error (albeit a large one). One phone call from them to Samaritan could have cleared everything up. It was the Matson’s responsibility to take care of their finances, and their lack of response to the hospital is what turned the situation into the mess they are in right now.

Has anyone else noticed that the Matsons were not awarded damages from Satanarim for ruining their credit score? It’s their natural right to do so! If this natural right was honored by the thugs we call legislators and the pigs who rule the court, then the weasels who run hospitals would think twice before dragging poor people into court to pay for their own f*ckups!

Boy, do I have an experience to share! Back in 2000, I was seeing a doctor for uterine cysts and endometriosis. The doctor’s office and insurance were both affiliated with Bellevue for imaging and bloodwork, so I used them for my tests. First, I was more than irritated by their lack of compassion, poor bedside maner and rough handling. About three years later (a year after having had my first child there, against my will – THAT’s a whole ‘nother sotry), I received a letter from a collection’s company saying that I owed some $2000 to Bellevue for a date 3 years prior for HIV testing and treatment! After putting my initial shock aside (I’ve been tested prior to each child and have come back negative, for the record), I called the collections agency. They said call Bellevue’s accounting department, and that they didn’t have any infomration in their file regarding the case # I gave them. Bellevue said that the bills were so old, and I hadn’t responded to any calls or invoices, that they turned ALL their documents over to the collection agency. Even as a young lady, I was no dummy – aren’t medical records (including financial) kept for at LEAST 7 years in the same office?? Also, I never received any phone calls, invoices, letters, ANYTHING, from bellevue or anyone else, prior to receiving the letter from the agency. I went round and round for anohter 18 months with Bellevue, the agency and my insurance company, trying to get an exact date of service and description of services rendered, and …long story short…there was no date of service and there most certainly was not any HIV testing or treatment! At this poing, my credit was shot, I was denied credit cards and car loans, and anythign I sent to the credit bureaus went ignored. Bellevue fraudulently billed “me”, but used a different middle initial, former address (many years former) and different SS number. When the collection agency finally got all of the information to verify this through my doctor (who never ordered such testing) and my insurance company (who didn’t show any claims near or around the stated date of service), they finally let the ase drop and close. Unfortunately, my credit was still scarred for almost a year before the credit reports could fully investigate and clear things up.

Regarding Comment #3: How is it the Matson’s responsibility to correct Satanarim’s error? The hospital had it’s own responsiblities, which were not the Matson’s, and it failed to uphold them. The jerk who dropped the ball which smashed the Matson’s credit score probably knew that. Billing clerks are not, in general, the most sensitive human beings, and the notion that the hospital staff decided he could make the poor couple pay while covering up his own error deserves investigation, prosecution, and restitution!

How the heck can you trust a hospital with your life if they can’t even get the bill right? Come on people, this isn’t rocket science it is plain and simple mismanagement by not only this hospital but just about every other hospital around the country.
Look at how hospitals have decided to do us a favor and not bill for mistakes that their doctors and nurses make that are malpractice!
Let’s face it, when you go to the hospital these days you are betting your life. The odds of coming out alive have gotten worse and the chance of them making a clerical mistake are pretty much a sure thing.

In Comment #2, Burned Too made a good point – it is certainly more wise to be proactive as a consumer than not too. However, let’s keep in mind who the consumer is, as opposed to who didn’t do the job they were paid to do. To hold the Matsons responsible for the damage perpetrated by their hospital is hardly fair while they are so busy trying to get done what THEY get paid for! There were simply no requirements, legal or policywise, for the Matsons to be doing someone else’s job for them. It seems that Burned Too doesn’t quite understand how blame-the-consumer rhetoric has been used to transform society into one which is very hostile toward all middle-class consumers – and the lost productivity among those not affluent enough to hire someone else to suffer through snot-infested phone trees brings down everyone. This presumes, of course, that you aren’t dealing with a malignant employee who would make resolution far more difficult.

I’m thinking that since the family ignored the hospital bills, they might also ignored the court date. As far as I understand, you are mailed a certified letter with delivery confirmation announcing your date. I work in tax department and I see this all the time. People start responding only when you take their refund or garnish their wages. The person what advised to be proactive is 100% correct.

XxHaimBandsX, Comment 11 – Yes, be proactive, but please don’t reinforce the anti-consumer climate by holding the Matsons responsible for cleaning up the hospitals error – fact is, it wasn’t their responsibility, therefore the hospital should be made to clean up all resulting damage.

My point is that if you simply sit on you hands, awaiting for someone else’s mistake to take care itself, you might have to bear some responsibility. With my experience, I would only count on myself. If I don’t, I would be the one complaining to the “advocate” spilling my sobbing stories to him.

Hospital billing is a nightmare. Without fail when my wife was seen in a hospital ( sickness, birth, testing,… ) we got an incorrect bill. It was usually quickly fixed within a month automatically, but I’m having a hard time remembering one incident where something was no billed improperly/incorrectly at first.

The insurance carrier are also a huge part of the problem as they seem to live by the motto “Deny first, wait for patient to respond”. Combined with hospital billing practice makes for a perfect storm for patients who often don’t owe a dime.

Wrong again, XxHaimBondsxX – while you should expect the nightmare for sitting on your hands, the RESPONSIBILITY for the damage is NOT what you should expect if you have completed your obligations per policy and law. I sure hope this doesn’t sound too much like nit-picking, because the semantics we use on this subject make all the difference in court.

To further clarify my comment #15 – you should expect the problems experienced by the Matsons only because they know as much as we do just how the conditions are. Idealistically, the conditions facing anybody who goes to a hospital for medical care should not exist – and nobody should expect the nightmare they suffered. Once, a generation ago, one would be called an idealist for striving to make the world BETTER than the one he/she grew up in!

dave sorry to say you dont live in the real world…..I laugh at your posts………..you are going to have, or maybe already have had, a long miserable life until the day you realize life is not fair….dont expect life to be fair, just exect life to be what you make of it…..you have a victim mentality, so you will always be a victim…..

bad things DO happen to good people, as happened here…we all need to be smart, play by lifes unwritten rules and be happier because of it…if they had just sent letters to the 3 credit agencies, attorney general, and the hospital, they would have been off the hook…..inconvenient but simple

Regarding Comment #7–it is NOT the Matson’s responsibility to correct the error; it IS the Matson’s responsibility to notify the hospital and insurance company of the error. It IS the responsibility of the Matsons to take control of their finances and to become aware of their rights and responsibilities and corrective procedures when problems occur. Doing nothing because you know you’re right is the worst thing you can do. The hospital is responsible for the mistake; the Matsons share the responsibility for the ensuing problems because they failed to act properly to protect their consumer rights.

No differently than anyone else, I too have had bills arrive that should not have. Unfortunately, my health at one point required me to be so much a part of the hospital scene, I learned more than I wanted to about all of this. The one’s I ignored (forgot, or figured the insurance would “catch up” are the ones that ended up in collections. It only took one time to not want my credit to be affected. It’s not like the hospital sent one bill and then went to court. She had to get at least 3-4 bills and then likely got a collection notice or two. 6 months of being billed at a minimum, and they couldn’t be bothered to contact the hospital? Yes the hospital messed up, however, they did their part by sending a bill that effectively says, “this is the information–please pay” and the bill for many hospitals usually says “call ‘here’ if you have a problem with this bill”. They didn’t. They need to take responsibility for their lack of attention to their financial affairs. An expensive way to learn that ignoring bills is hazardous to your lifestyle. I’d like to know what billing skills have to do with Doctor/nursing skills. They may both work at the same place, and the medical staff can really bollux up billing by not giving them everything correctly, but that’s all I see that connects. Billing doesn’t dictate nursing/doctoral care.(Insurance seems to!!) Hospitals have tons of paperwork to do, all kinds of reg’s to document on each patient. What a surprise the HUMAN factor would come into it. Who among you gets your job done mistake free EVERY day with the volume they do, and the hours hospital staff generally put in? Many billing area’s work like the doctors/nursing. shifts of 12-16 hours and pay that’s laughable.

I would of loved to act sooner but I never got a bill until two years after my son was born. I had no idea I owed anyone money. I hardly call that sitting on my hands. I just hope this never happends to you because five years is a long time to deal with people who just dont care. So my next step will be going to Supreme Court. I have more than enough proof I had Insurance what the hospital employees do with it is not up to me!

I guess you realy cant grasp the whole thing unless you sat face to face with me to get the whole story from start to finish to here for yourself everything I had to deal with. I wasnt sobbing to the Advocate I wanted prople to here what I have been dealing with so they can watch out for this kind of thing and or maby something get the hospital so step up say they were wrong from the start and get some help in the deparments needed

Should the error have been made in the first place? No. Do we live in a perfect world? No. Do people make mistakes? Yes.
That being said, each and every one of us has a personal responsibility to take care of our own well being (including our financial well being). One phone call to the hospital (“Hi..This is Mrs. Matson…I am just curious as to why I am being billed when I have insurance…oh, you made an error, do you need me to send my insurance info again? Thank you so much. Have a nice day) could have saved them all this trouble. That hospital has 1,000s of people and accounts they are responsible for, the Matsons only have themselves. These people are either ignorant, arrogant, or lazy to have ignored the bills that were sent to them. Lesson learned. Be your OWN advocate and take personal responsibility for your actions. While it sounds like Dan Higgins tried to present both sides of the case, it doesn’t seem like the Matsons are taking any personal responsibility for their own errors (ignoring bills, court orders, etc).

We had a very similar issue with Samaritan Hospital. What is the point of filling out all the registration and insurance forms if the hospital is going to ignore them or use old information anyway. As Samaritan and Albany Memorial are linked, we saw one doctor at Albany Memorial and then went for a second opinion at Samaritan. At both hospitals, we were required to fill out registration and insurance forms. Everything with the doctor/surgery at Albany Memorial went fine. However, the only thing we ever heard from Samaritan was when we received a call from the collection agency on our cell phone stating we owed $100. They said Samaritan had been mailing us bills and trying to call us. We did NOT receive any bills nor phone calls. After several months of trying to clear this up, we found that Samaritan was using my husband’s old address (not even his previous address but one before that) and old phone number (no longer in existence). How can they not update their records and if they are linked with Albany Memorial, how can one site have the correct information and the other site can’t even manage to pull the same information up on the computer system. After much discussion, Samaritan also gave us a letter for the credit bureaus, which we were told was not sufficient also. I am all for forgiving people’s mistakes, we are, after all, only human, but when the companies who make the mistakes won’t take responsibility, that’s not right. I am not saying the people who made the mistake didn’t take responsibility, their hands were tied by how much they could do to rectify the credit situation due to upper management. It’s very frustrating – having your name and credit ruined seems to be easy for people to do to you, but very hard for you to get it cleared up, even when it’s no fault of your own.
One last comment, if the hospital was able to give the collection agency our cell phone number, why didn’t they call us in the first place when they felt there was a balance due that we weren’t paying instead of just using the old information and then sending it to collection?????

Dave, the reason I am writing this is, because I went through exact situation when my wife gave birth. A month later a received a bill from the hospital, and although we received excellent care, our bill was 4 times less than Matson’s. I called the next day to their billing department and gave insurance id number over the phone. That was it. It was odd that they sent me this bill since I remember clearly that they made a copy of the card, however, it did not kill me to call them. Whether it was an intentional mistake or accidental, I don’t care. A simple phone call has fixed it.

to 23 and 24 I guess your not reading the story phone calls were made!!!!!!!!! It was to late the insurance company doesnt have to pay any bills after 90 days of service. The matsons didnt know thay had a outstanding bill untill TWO years after theire son was born.

#7 Dave – It’s not necessarily your duty to correct the mistakes of others, but when those mistakes affect you, it’s usually smarter to be proactive before something serious happens. (like ruined credit)

Medical billing is complex, and mistakes happen. The victim here could have invested 15 minutes of her time to fix it ages ago, but was too lazy to do so. The result of that laziness has included court cases, hours of wasted time and more hours to come — as working with credit bureaus to fix credit problems after the fact is a very difficult thing to do.

i worked for a debt collection agency and let me tell you. You dont know how many people did NOT get bills from the creditor, but guess what? it wound up in a law firm. Doesnt matter as long as they have some little “documentation” in their system saying a letter or bill went out. thats CYA. When they make a mistake its an “error”.

When someone who OWES a bill doesnt get it paid on time they are considered deadbeats. Hey, how about this? it was “human error” that i didnt remember to pay my bill? how does THAT fly? Not too good huh? thought so.

This hospital’s billing department is clearly full of incompetents. I went to their ER in 2/07 filled out all of their paperwork and gave them my insurance card for them to copy. I have recevied bill after bill for the full amount of the visit from them. Every month I had to call them only to have them tell me my insurance had not yet paid or had denied the claim. I gave them my insurance information over the phone at least 5 times. I finally stopped getting bills about a year later. In June of this year I received ANOTHER bill for the full amount of the visit indicating my insurance had denied the claim. I called them AGAIN and they told me we billed your insurance and they denied the claim. At that point I had switched jobs and had another carrier so I thought maybe that had something to do with it. I verified what insurance info they had for me. Turns out for well over a year, even though they had a copy of my card and I told them over the phone multiple times who my carrier was and all the group, id, phone numbers and addresses…they chose to bill some random company I never had coverage with over and over. I had them send me a copy of the bill with all of the codes etc. on it, I sent it to my insurance company at the time and they paid it within 30 days. I’m glad my company didn’t care that it was almost 18 months later that they finally got the bill, had that been the case the hospital SURELY would have eaten that bill. Absolutely ridiculous that this seems to be business as usual for Samaritan.

Chris,
I believe you are missing the point of my comment. We did not know we had an outstanding balance until a year later when the collection agency called us on our cell phone. However, the outcome was the same meaning it caused credit issues for us as well. Since we had also supplied the correct information, the hospital was at fault for not updating their records. My comment regarding the cell phone number was strictly for my situation. I would, however, have to believe that if Samaritan had called the Matsons before sending it to collection, they would have told them they had insurance, whether it was over 90 days or not. The hospital would have realized at that point it was their fault and maybe, the whole court/credit situation could have been avoided. Maybe the Matsons should have called the hospital when they received the bill, but that doesn’t excuse the hospital for making the insurance coding mistake in the first place. We did not have the opportunity to pay our bill because we never received them due to the hospital not updating their records.
The other similarity that I didn’t mention before is that our problem happened 5 years ago also.

I just reread the story and I misspoke by saying the hospital didn’t call before going to court. Mrs. Matson did call the hospital when they got the bill two years later. The fact that the hospital continued the law suit is even more baffling now. It was their error, they knew it and still went after them. Their refusal to pay the bill is totally understandable. Reading this just brought back all the very bad memories of what happened to us and reinforces my comment about how someone can ruin a part of your life and not be held accountable for the damage done. I wish the Matsons the best of luck in rectifying their situation.

Comment #17, by goldenjake, and all who missed my point completely while mistaking me for a naive idiot – you misunderstand me on a fundamental, and critical level – I live very much in the real world, and I do not advocate any naive or less than vigilant approach to dealing with any improper bills from anyone. I was simply making the point concerning who should be held accountable. By accountable, I refer to how the legal court ruling should go down. You may leave your house unlocked, and then you may choose security which is not the most state-of-the-art. If you were to pose the question “at what degree of negligence for security should the homeowner be held responsible in a court of law for any burglaries which occur, well this sort of question would be directly analagous to any statement that the insuree should be held responsible for not being proactive against Samaratan Hospital’s violence to his/her credit. I do not expect the world to operate fairly, nor am I a naive goober which would expect the courts to rule fairly, BUT – IF YOU THINK THIS SORT OF FAIRNESS IS TOO MUCH TO ASK OF THE COURTS, AND YOU WON’T DEMAND IT OF THEM, (NO MATTER HOW THEY RULE) THEN THERE IS NO REDEEMING SOCIAL VALUE IN GOVERNMENT, PERIOD!!!! Is that too difficult a concept for you to grasp? Thank you so much, gooooldenjake, for your part in supporting the status quo!

Wow! Samaritan stuck again ! I was reading all the above and wondered how this Hospital can get away with it. The issue here is Samaritan sued the patient for the service they rendered and the patient sued back. Did you ever heard Samaritan has billed the insurance on behalf of a patient for the service they NEVER RENDERED and demanding the difference from the patient? Yes, that’s exactly happened in my case.

I also have had an issue with Samaritan. I used to work for Northeast Health and was told by HR that procedures done would be, upon my date of hire, covered by the facility – even though insurance wasn’t active for three months. Well, I had an scan done and went about my daily life working there. Over a year later I received a summons from court (by way of a lawyer’s office in Newburgh NY) that I had to appear in court for not paying over $1000 in bills to Samaritan Hospital. Not once was anything sent to my house. I worked in their building 5-6 days per week and not once was anything sent to the department where I worked. Not once was anything enclosed with my paystub. NOTHING. I spoke to the Human Resources and Billing departments and was told first that it would be completely resolved and then later that nothing could be done. End result, after a lot of run around and misinformation, I had no option but to pay a bill that I was told would be covered. It wasn’t what made me decide to leave employment there, but it’s at the top of a very long list. Northeast Health, Samaritan in particular, is the last place I will go to have anything done.

Sooooo. Matson didn’t respond to the phone calls because she knew she had insurance? I know I have insurance too but if a hospital called me to tell me I didn’t, you can bet your butt I’d respond with a big, “YES I DO!”

I know this must have been a humiliating pain for them but the fault lies mostly with them.

I Love New York, especially The Albany area. It is my true home. However, I moved many years ago, and live in a State where a judgement is no more than a piece of paper. It is filed, and unless you pay it, it remains just a piece of unenforcable paper. However, I suggest that we pay any judgements against us, as they will hammer our credit, and we all know that without credit, we are sunk. Cash does not speak at most airlines, ETC. Plastic is King. What a blow that must have been?? To have wages garnished without notice. Of course, in the State I live in, you had better pay your child support, if your in that position. They will not only garnish your wages, but they will also cancel out your drivers license. If you get stopped for any infraction, you will not stop for long. You will go straight to jail. So, also, please don’t let your license expire in Florida, even if you just forgot, you will take a trip to the Pokey.

well, it isn’t necessarily the patients fault anyway…I keep getting billed for co-payments that were paid, because the hospital and doctor’s office can’t keep track…i went to my doctor and paid $100 in co-payments at the end of a visit, the following week they were askign me for the same $100 plus the new co-payment, I then had to spend substantial time obtaining a copy fo the check form the previosu week from my bank, plus proof of payments for co-payments going back for a 3 year period to prove i didn’t owe them aything but that one day’s co-payment.

I did not realize that ruined credit could keep a patient from getting a job. In the long run, it cost her her life. A clerical error caused Belinda to lose her medical insurance in college. She became uninsurable due to “preexisting conditions.” Of course you can “always go to the emergency room” which is what she always did. We all know that the ER is the most effective way to deal with chronic illness. She did see a private doctor but often could not afford medicine and could not afford tests. She was urged to go to “county” but this did not prove helpful and she was hounded by bill collectors for the supposedly “free” service. She told me they told her it went by “zip code” whatever that means.

Belinda died of liver failure after an attempt by UCLA to save her with an eleventh hour transplant. Her brain was too badly damaged by hepatic encephalopathy. My beautiful, talented, intelligent daughter could not get a job the last several years of her life. She couldn’t understand why. They would seem to like her but she wouldn’t get called back after the initial interview. She never knew that her ruined credit was the culprit. Too bad she didn’t know how to “work the system” but she was honest. She was told she didn’t have any children and so didn’t qualify for Medi-Cal. Unable to buy private insurance, unable to get employer-based insurance and unable to “qualify” for public help until it was too late, Belinda has become a mere statistic. But to me the pain of losing her will never go away. I miss her more than anyone can ever know.